The homeless among us

Sunday

Jan 29, 2012 at 12:01 AMJan 29, 2012 at 12:15 AM

Think of homeless people and your mind instantly conjures up images of an unshaven old man in ragged clothes lying in a heap on a dirty city street, or a disheveled woman carrying a shopping bag, shuffling along a subway concourse while mumbling to herself. It takes a minute to realize that the homeless are much closer than the city, and that they aren’t all old or dealing with some mental infirmity.

You need only search off the beaten path and you might find evidence of the problem right here in Bucks County: People who call some crude shelter their home. People in the so-called prime of life. People whose mental faculties are intact.

A combination of circumstance and, yes, often personal choice has led them to this particular way of life.

Several teams of Bucks County employees were out and about recently looking for the so-called “unsheltered homeless” in a kind of census that’s required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD wants to make sure that counties are adequately providing for their populations of homeless people. County officials know these homeless are out there, many of them in Lower Bucks. But they’re also living in more-affluent Central and Upper Bucks, though, as the county census teams discovered, they’re harder to find there.

One homeless man who was found said he chose to “live” in a wooded area in Warminster because it was hidden from view and hard to get to, giving him a feeling of being safe. He was 46, and said he’d been homeless for about seven years. He also had an arrest record for petty crimes: harassment, public drunkenness, disorderly conduct. His experience in shelters and halfway houses apparently convinced him that life was better on the outside. For him, personal independence is worth living in a shelter made of wooden pallets, surviving on welfare and food stamps and handouts from friends and strangers.

When the county workers asked if they could do anything for him, the man wasn’t interested in the offer.

There’s not much any government agency can do for people like the 46-year-old man in the Warminster woods who would rather be left alone or live with others facing a similar predicament. (There’s a large encampment of homeless people in Bristol Township.)

Homeless shelters do keep busy at night, particularly in the winter months. During the day, some homeless people visit with case workers, or with members of the clergy, or with friends. Maybe they’ll seek shelter in a place of business or public building. Those who have run afoul of the law might have to keep in contact with a parole officer. Some just wander around, one day pretty much the same as the next.

Besides the shelters, help is available for the homeless. There’s assistance for finding a permanent residence, for finding a job, for finding hope.

But the homeless have to want to be helped, and they have to be willing to take some responsibility for improving their lot in life. Those men and women who are willing deserve all the help and encouragement they need.

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